Since I'm only now beginning to acknowledge the reality that Google Reader is disappearing—it took me six years to deal with Prescriptives discontinuing their concealer pencil, so this is swift for me—I've also taken a good look at my blog feed and have realized it could use a renewal. I love being able to direct you to so many blogs I adore, and I'll keep doing so, but let's reverse the information flow for a bit. What blogs or news sources do you turn to for sharp, insightful takes on beauty, fashion, femininity, feminism, social criticism, or anything else that might be relevant to The Beheld?

What's going on in beauty this week, from head to toe and everything in between.

Spotted on Princess Beatrice.

From Head...Kale humor:Kale fascinator! I don't care if this was an April Fool's joke, I'm in. (Actually, this was a big week for kale, and possibly jokes about kale: The last question on this "do you have orthorexia?" quiz is "Do you enjoy kale?"—because clearly kale cannot be enjoyed unless one has an eating disorder. Atossa floated the idea that it's a joke, which I hope it is, but the rest of the piece is totally straight so I'm not sure. Thoughts?)

...To Toe...

Pedi protection: These look sorta silly, but they could be worse—and for impatient types comme moi, these pedicure protector shells could come in super-handy.

...And Everything In Between:The house that soap built: The palatial erstwhile home of James Gamble, creator of Ivory Soap and son of the original Gamble of Procter &, was demolished this week in a suburb of Cincinnati.

Family values: An Avon lady won a suit against the company after her manager told her, "If you wish to have a family life, this is not the job for you"—meaning that she was expected to put in 60 hours a week instead of the 40 she'd been doing when she was promoted to area manager. I've championed Avon and other woman-helmed cosmetics companies before for being family-friendly, so this is particularly aggravating.

Heads-up to all my Greek neo-Nazi followers: Your leader is urging you to boycott Estee Lauder products after the chairman of the board, Ronald Lauder, stated that Greece should ban Golden Dawn, the fast-growing neo-Nazi political party that enjoys a public support rating of 11.5%. If flying the flag of fascism is more important to you than buying as much M.A.C. lip liner as you damn well please—well, I can't stop you, but one of us will have nicely lined lips, and it ain't you, so just think about that, mmmkay?

Sixty-nine percent of Vikings report that ale wenches influence how they style their body hair.

Hair/style: The buried lede on this piece about how the men's personal care sector is recruiting women as spokespeople, presumably because men pretty themselves up to impress women: The new term for manscaping is body hair styling. Styling! I'm picturing love beads and beard braids à la Vikings.

On your toes: Abu Dhabi woman files complaint against a beauty salon she claims burned her toe during a pedicure. "The complainant, who is in her 20s and wears an abaya, says she shows very little of her body in public and should at least be able to show her toes. 'I want to show my toes in public and cannot ... my big toe is still red after all these months.'"

"This was about me being me": Britt Julious has an excellent piece on what's seen by some (including her) as an overpoliticization of black women's hair—a politicization that forgets that at the root of said politics lies the matter of personal agency. (Her follow-up is worth a read too.)

What a waste: This 8-foot-high sculpture made of lipstick tubes raised the Makeup Museum curator's critical eyebrow (and my own too): It's meant to raise consumer awareness of environmental waste. Yay for thinking about the impact of our purchases and all that, but choosing something as gendered as lipstick to use to illustrate the point seems...well, a little lady-blamey, oui? (Although I'd happily jump on a campaign to ban civilian Hummers, and that's pretty damn gendered too, but the environmental impact is also roughly eight gazillion times greater, so.)

Mirror challenge!: I know plenty of you reading this are bloggers, so here's your call to arms: If Kjerstin Gruys went a year without mirrors (and yours truly went a month, twice at that!), surely you can go a day without 'em and write about your experiences, right? More details here.

"Pics or it didn't happen": The rise of the "ugly selfie"—and how it's not necessarily as courageous as it might seem to post them. "More confronting than the intentionally 'ugly' selfie is the unintentionally ugly candid. If I take a picture of myself poking my tongue out, scrunching up my face, or pulling my neck in to create a double chin, it does little to threaten my sense of self or attractiveness. In some respects, it is even less threatening than a conventionally attractive 'selfie,' in which I am declaring, without explicitly saying so, that this is a photo in which I think I look good. .. But in a photo that is taken unawares, in which I am staring blankly at my computer, or standing at an unflattering angle, or just caught making a less-than-flattering expression, there is the suggestion that perhaps that is what I 'really' look like."

Speaking of selfies:Mr. Teacup muses on why we decry the narcissism of self-portraits without dropping the beauty standard that plays into that narcissism in the first place (and in doing so, brings readers to a CBC debate on the topic—which is all well and good and features Sarah Nicole Prickett, who consistently has interesting things to say, but given that so much of the criticism about selfies is directed toward women, I can't help but wonder why she was the only female guest panelist. Picky, I know, but that's me).

Speaking of selfies again: Blisstree's Carrie Murphy has a crankily hilarious post about the tin-ear pitches she gets from plastic surgery PR folks. (One of which involved tips from a plastic surgeon on how to look better in selfies. Presumably at least one of the tips is, Get plastic surgery?)

One less worry: Taking "empowering" beyond a buzzword about beauty and fashion, here's Sally: "We live in a world that frequently evaluates women based on our looks and, if those looks are found to be somehow lacking, dismisses us. ... To help women have one less thing to worry about as they chase their dreams, rise to power, or express their creativity is to help them tap a vast reservoir of potential."